


Undoing

by wynnebat



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Timelines, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Auror Harry Potter, Exes, Hospitals, Hurt No Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-30
Updated: 2019-06-30
Packaged: 2020-05-31 07:30:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19421338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wynnebat/pseuds/wynnebat
Summary: “I thought you were dead,” Tom says, so very quietly that Harry might be able to pretend that he hadn’t even said it at all. It’s not his usual tone; nothing about Tom Riddle is ever hesitant, nor is it soft. Harry had been able to live with that once upon a time.





	Undoing

**Author's Note:**

> Prompted by storytellingandtea. 
> 
> A bit of angst with no plans of continuation. Tom was born in the modern era and attended Hogwarts with Harry.

“I thought you were dead,” Tom says, so very quietly that Harry might be able to pretend that he hadn’t even said it at all. It’s not his usual tone; nothing about Tom Riddle is ever hesitant, nor is it soft. Harry had been able to live with that once upon a time.

Harry had woken up when Tom first entered, but it’s only now that Tom speaks that he forces himself to sit up in the bed. Every turn of his body hurts. Hiding a sound of pain behind a sigh, Harry turns to look at Tom. It’s dark in Harry’s room but light in the corridor just outside it. Tom is all shadows and dark features, but it’s the best glimpse of him that Harry has gotten in the four years since they graduated Hogwarts and Harry put an end to everything they were, everything he’d ardently wished they could be.

“Who let you into my hospital room?” Harry notices a glass of water on the table next to the bed, but he can’t reach it with the level of pain his arm is in. The only thing worse than seeing Tom as soon as he woke up would be embarrassing himself immediately after.

“I have my ways,” Tom replies.

It’s such a stark reminder of everything that Harry looks away from him for a moment, lest he _really_ try to embarrass himself by trying to punch Tom. When he looks back, Tom has taken a step closer. Moonlight falls onto his stupidly handsome face. He’d look so fucking good with a broken nose. Three years, and Harry still can’t look at Tom without anger ripping through him with needles and knives.

Something flickers across Tom’s face. It’s too late at night, too dark, too long, for Harry to identify the emotion anymore. He doesn’t care to try. “Lestrange’s sister works here. That’s all.”

“Fine,” Harry replies, his voice hoarse. Fuck it. Despite the pain, he reaches for the glass of water. Tom reaches out to steady Harry’s grip. Harry turns his thumb so that his nail digs into the meat of Tom’s hand, his gaze meeting Tom’s the entire time. When Tom lets go, Harry lifts the glass to his lips. His hand shakes, but the glass stays upright from pure spite. He feels on the verge of passing out.

Maybe Tom is only a hallucination of his mind. Except no, his mind wouldn’t be so cruel. If he were to hallucinate, he’d see the Tom from their Hogwarts days. Not this one. This Tom’s robes are a cut above Madam Malkin’s best, the kind of shit that purebloods wear. _You’re not one of them,_ Harry thinks, but he’s said that so many times, and it hasn’t mattered. Harry’s own wardrobe is full of auror’s robes and day robes that are just old Hogwarts robes with the crest cut off. He and Ron spent an afternoon carefully removing the crests and patting themselves on the back for their brilliant idea.

Two sips is more than Harry’s throat can take. He eyes the distance to the bedside table, but before he can make the attempt, the glass returns there on its own. It’s not St. Mungo’s magic, but at least Tom didn’t try to physically take the glass. Harry’s so magically exhausted right now that he wouldn’t be able to manage a Leviosa; he can still use his wand to stab. Useful things, wands.

A few blinks, and Harry realizes Tom is talking. It would take more energy than Harry has to listen.

“I don’t care,” Harry says, cutting off Tom’s speech. As usual, it’s full of blame and self-importance, just like the last time Tom tried to talk to him. Harry can’t imagine that much has changed in the three years since they last spoke. He recognizes that crease in Tom’s brow, that look he gets when he’s interrupted, and it used to make him laugh. He would interrupt Tom again just for fun, and then he’d kiss that look from his face, and Tom would try so hard to be annoyed. It’s not a happy memory. Harry takes a breath. It hurts. He takes another one. “Tom, whatever this is, it doesn’t matter. Alright?” There is so much that he should say. There are people dead and questions Harry should ask. Of the two people in this room, Harry is the auror, no matter that he is bedridden and in pain. “It doesn’t matter.”

He reaches for the mediwitch communication pad, but it flies out of his reach and slams against the wall.

“Forgive me,” Tom begins, fury lacing his tone, “If I’m not finished yet. It was reported that your entire auror team died. I learned of it hours after the fact and it took another hour before I found it wasn’t even true. There was one survivor. Do you know how that made me feel?”

“Like you should get your information from better sources,” Harry offers. “Rather than the pureblood gossip network.”

“You could be in a grave right now, together with the rest of your team. And for what? A pointless, horrific death for a dying cause. Do you value your life so little? Is that what this is, why you won’t open your eyes and see the truth?”

“Are you done?”

Tom rears back. He spits out, “I am in love with you.” It’s said like a curse, like it’s his very favorite one. Harry knows Tom wasn’t among the pureblood radicals who had attacked their team, but it so easily could have been.

“Yeah, I know.” If it wouldn’t hurt so much, Harry would laugh at the look on Tom’s face. “First time I knew something before you, huh?” He shakes his head. Or maybe that’s more lenient of a description than the tiny movement Harry’s head actually makes. “I bet it’s killing you.”

“I’d rather kill you.”

At that, Harry does give a small huff of laughter. “What’s stopping you? It can’t be my mad auror skills. I’m as weak as a kitten. Go back, Tom. Your fiancee’s probably tracking you down as we speak.” Harry swallows, remembering the wild dark hair behind one of those stupid masks the pureblood radicals wore. He’ll mention it in his report, not that it will be of any use. The detail will be gone before the report goes anywhere. No one will dare to implicate a Black in this ugly mess that’s beginning to spill into wizarding society. “We both made our choices. Right or wrong—it doesn’t matter.”

“I’ll prepare myself for your funeral, then,” Tom says, his lips twisted.

Harry gets one last look at him, and he looks his fill. Fuck, he’s missed him. He’s told himself that it’s Hogwarts he missed, but that’s a lie. He misses sneaking around the castle with Tom, misses his hands and his mouth. Misses their friendship. It’s all mixed up in his head, friendship and love and the heartbreak of finding out that Tom’s love didn’t hold a candle to his ambition.

“Goodbye, Tom,” Harry offers, and Tom doesn’t say the words in return.

When emptiness fills the room again, Harry lies back down and stares up at the white ceiling. He’s alive, and that’s all there is.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I'm also on [tumblr](https://wynnefic.tumblr.com/).


End file.
